I already wrote quite a bit about why I think APB and its developer Realtime Worlds find themselves in a bit of a tight spot these days. APB, though a flawed game, is a fun one and it’ll be a real shame if the title’s taken down before it has a chance to grow and find its footing. But all that said, part of me wishes that instead of the experiment that is APB, I really would have liked to see RTW continue making Crackdown games.

I know a lot of the staff that worked on the sequel from Ruffian Games were in fact from Realtime Worlds. But tell me, those of you who played the original Crackdown, wouldn’t APB have been a great deal cooler if it were more Crackdown-esque in its gameplay? Wouldn’t APB have been a helluva lot more fun if they ditched a lot of the poorly executed “realism” and went instead with a more ridiculous tone that made Crackdown such a little gem in the 360’s early years?

One reason the Crackdown games are so fun is because of their online component. Playing around in such a large area with friends, tossing trucks into pedestrians, jumping over buildings, laying down mines and then watching the havoc unfold… Crackdown might be a little shallow, but it’s not short on fun when it comes to multiplayer. Now imagine that the best of the multiplayer action from both Crackdown and APB were merged. Massive superhuman warfare between two opposing sides on a large scale in a city that’s ripe for the climbing, jumping, throwing fun that RTW’s freshman offering gave us.

I still don’t think I’d pay a subscription or buy twenty hours a time to play a massively online Crackdown, but I’d certainly find it a more compelling game at its very core, and I’d wager a lot of Xbox 360 owners would as well. But then, that’s the console gamer in me talking. Sorry, it’s hard to shut him up sometimes.